Mobile and fixed line communication devices (“communication devices”), such as cellular phones, two-way radios, or home phones, have become ubiquitous. In fact some reports show telephone use by eighty seven percent of the global population. The commonality of these devices has resulted in their public use within the local vicinity of others. Conventional communication devices are not always suitable for public use. First, use of a conventional communication device in public often requires the user to expose the private details of a communication to others within the local vicinity. Even when a user retreats to a secluded location, the communications are subject to eavesdropping (e.g., by parabolic microphone, binoculars for lip reading, laser sound pick-up devices, and other distance eavesdropping devices). Subjecting the details of a secret or private communication to others is particularly concerning when such details involve matters of national security (e.g., details concerning FBI, CIA, diplomat's, fire station, police, or military matters). Second, ambient noises in public areas can frequently disrupt a communication. For instance, ambient noise can frequently make it difficult for the user of the communication device to receive clear communications on the communication devices or to speak understandable commands to a device's computer assistant employing voice recognizing software (e.g., SIRI® as utilized by the iPhone®). Thus, a need exists for apparatus and related methods for maintaining the privacy and clarity of communications over communication devices while avoiding the disturbance of others in the vicinity.
In view of the foregoing, many have proposed apparatus for enhancing privacy and clarity of communication devices while avoiding the disturbance of others nearby. These proposed apparatus involve covering the mouth or ear of a communication device so that a chamber is created over the mouth or ear in an attempt to confine the communicative sounds while blocking ambient noise. For instance, U.S. Pat. No. 7,564,968, US. Pub. App. No. 2011/0136535, U.S. Pat. No. 7,197,140, U.S. Pat. No. 8,778,062, and U.S. Pat. No. 7,515,708 disclose apparatus that are positioned over or in front of a mouth. Although capable of limited muffling of communicative sounds produced by the user of a communication device, these devices are not capable of capturing all of the communicative sounds of a device user that would otherwise be intelligible to those in the nearby vicinity. While some of these devices are capable of blocking small amounts of the direct field of communicative sounds, they are frequently inadequate for containing the more intense reverberant fields of the human speech sounds, for example, the reverberant fields of a male voice can be as low as eighty Megahertz (MHz). This functional inadequacy is the result of two factors. First, the materials (or lack thereof) employed are not capable of absorbing enough of the communicative sound to render the communication unintelligible to eavesdroppers. Second, the chambers are not air-tight (particularly at any interface between the apparatus and the user's face (specifically, the ear and mouth)). When a chamber and related parts of the device are not air-tight, the direct or reverberant fields of the near-field (sounds in close proximity to the sound source) communicative sound (which is an acoustic sound wave through air) can leak out from the chamber before being totally absorbed by the chamber walls. Even when such apparatus initially form a seal around the mouth of a user, these seals can be upset by either (1) the sound air pressure or acoustic particle velocity of the communicative sound's near field sound energy (which are much more extreme than direct or reverberant fields) or (2) misalignment of the mouth and chamber near the upper and lower lips (i.e., the menton-subnasale length, bitragoin-subnasale arc area, and bitragoin-menton arc area) during movements of a user's face during normal speech. Misalignment along the menton-subnasale length, bitragoin-subnasale arc area, and bitragoin-menton arc area is particularly problematic when an apparatus must simultaneously provide mouth and ear coverings use because these devices allow the ear coverings to operate despite misalignment along the and the menton-subnasale length area, bitragoin-subnasale arc area, or bitragoin-menton arc during movements of a user's face whereby a user may not even realize that sound from a private communication is being released. Even the slightest release of sound can be concerning during extremely sensitive communications over a communication device, for instance, during doctor-patient communications, lawyer-client communications, stockbroker-investor communications, interfamily communications, or communications involving national security. Furthermore, these devices are not substantially available for blocking ambient noise and thus clarity of communication using these devices can be compromised.
Other apparatus for enhancing privacy or clarity of communication involve a user facemask for creating a chamber over the mouth of a user. See, e.g., US Pub. Pat. No. 2007/0127659, U.S. Pat. No. 8,234,944, U.S. Pat. No. 7,783,034, and CN Pat. No. 2262732. However, these types of apparatus suffer from the drawbacks mentioned above, with the additional problem of being attention calling. Frequently, participants of a private communication, like national security agency members, do not want additional attention drawn to them by their communication device during sensitive telephone communications. Additionally: none of these facemask apparatus allow the user to breath freely while being used without taking the device away from their face; none of the prior art have a controlled direction of airflow with sound energy to exit out the device in a controlled manner, with the users air from speech passing across a microphone without the intake air passing by the microphone so no acoustic interference will occur with the microphone; and none of the prior art use materials that are technically capable to absorb the low base frequencies i.e. modelling clay that does not dry out and remains malleable.
Musicians, like communication device users, are frequently desirous of privately or discretely producing sounds in public areas. For instance, opera singers or woodwind instrument players may desire to practice their craft in a public park without disturbing the splendor of the general public. Like users of communication devices, a musician cannot always retreat to a secluded location or even their homes because, for example, within many neighborhoods (especially modern apartments, condominium and townhomes) people are increasingly living in closer proximity to one another. Thus a need exists for apparatus and related methods for maintaining the privacy of musical sounds.
For singers, apparatus exist that are similar to those described above in connection with communication devices. See, e.g., U.S. Pat. No. 2,625,615, U.S. Pat. No. 4,396,089, and U.S. Pat. No. 4,932,495. These devices are essentially facemasks that cover the mouth of the singer in an attempt to create a sound muffling chamber over the mouth. These apparatus are particularly susceptible to leaked sounds. As discussed above in connection with apparatus for communication privacy apparatus, such chambers either are either (a) not capable of absorbing the near, direct, and reverberant fields of a singer's voice or (b) allow sounds to leak via misalignment of the mouth and chamber along the mentocervical angle length, menton-subnasale length, bitragoin-subnasale arc, or bitragoin-menton arc during movements of a user's face. Misalignment of the face contours and mask are particularly problematic during singing since the users facial movements are exaggerated when compared to a person that is talking, particularly along the menton-subnasale length. Other problems arise in that the apparatus distort the sounds made by the user so that a user cannot totally tell if the sounds produced are correct. Therefore, a need exists for apparatus and related methods for maintaining the privacy of musical sounds of singers.
For woodwind instrument players, apparatus also exists for dampening the sound of the instrument. However, these apparatus typically involve either placing a covering around the whole instrument, or muffling the sound. These types of apparatus do not adequately address the need for apparatus that maintain the privacy of musical sounds. One reason these are inadequate is that many woodwind instruments require a user's hands to move over and about the instrument. Encasing the instrument is problematic because the encasing apparatus must feature holes that leak sound while providing hand-access or else restrict access to the instrument. Muting the instrument is problematic because the musician must hear the noises to determine whether the instrument is being played correctly. As a result, a need still exists for apparatus and related methods for maintaining the privacy of musical sounds of singers.